Harvey Peeler

Legislators have worked out a compromise on a bill requiring South Carolina voters to show photo IDs before they cast a ballot.

The state Senate remained in recess Thursday while legislators typed up the specifics.

Republican Sen. Larry Martin said senators have agreed to 30 days of early voting, and a photo ID won’t be required for elections this year.

Senate Democrats have been blocking the legislation with more than 1,000 amendments. Senators haven’t gotten past the first during the filibuster that started Wednesday afternoon.

Berkeley County Senator Larry Grooms took issue to comments he says compared supporting the bill to modern day lynching.

“Wanting ballot security and wanting that is the same as murdering people is wrong,” said Grooms.

Republicans say the issue is about preventing voter fraud, and that everyone should be accustomed to flashing ID.

But Democrats liken the bill to poll taxes, literacy tests and other ways whites kept blacks from voting in South Carolina’s past.

Opponents of the bill like Orangeburg Senator John Matthews said that fraud just doesn’t happen here.

“Our Election Commission says they’ve had nobody they can recollect in recent years showing up at the polls trying to use someone else’s identity,” said Matthews.

Opponents also say the bill would have disenfranchised thousands of minority and elderly voters, who currently vote with no picture ID.

“There you can see 31 percent of the 178,00 voters are non-white, so you can see how it affects non-white voters,” said Senator Joel Lourie.

Senate Pro Tempore Glenn McConnell expects the bill to take effect next year, But Senate and house lawmakers still have to agree on a final version.

WIStv